tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post1261761373503151765..comments2024-03-28T17:53:43.541-04:00Comments on DarwinCatholic: In Defense of E. B. White's Talking AnimalsDarwinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08572976822786862149noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-1445927936780975012019-07-16T07:20:15.104-04:002019-07-16T07:20:15.104-04:00Agnes,
Yeah, fairy tales and other seriously old ...Agnes,<br /><br />Yeah, fairy tales and other seriously old stories can range from disturbing-if-you-think-about-them to just plain absurdist. <br /><br />On the merely absurdist side, I've always liked the Aesop's Fable where a satyr meets a man on a cold day and invites him in. The man is blowing on his hands, and the satyr asks why. "To warm them," the man says. The satyr then offers him some hot soup. The man blows on it too. "Why are you doing that?" the satyr asks. "To cool it," the man explain.<br /><br />"Get out!" the satyr orders. I'll have nothing to do with someone who blows both hot and cold.<br /><br />It seems like it ought to mean something, but it doesn't really.Darwinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08572976822786862149noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-14328838295587683922019-07-15T22:02:11.831-04:002019-07-15T22:02:11.831-04:00Timothy Graham,
That's a fair point. I'd...Timothy Graham,<br /><br />That's a fair point. I'd been thinking of the Beavers in particular, who don't strike me as being particularly animal-like. Same with Reepicheep. On the other hand, the dogs and the bear in Last Battle are quite animal-ish. Darwinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08572976822786862149noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-43658615952326510522019-07-15T07:26:47.540-04:002019-07-15T07:26:47.540-04:001) Wow, that Hungarian story reminds me a lot of t...1) Wow, that Hungarian story reminds me a lot of the Japanese one about the kid in the bamboo stalk. Re: the handmaids, that sounds like a story hook that just isn't used in the version we have.<br /><br />2) A lot of kids' stories take place in a dream universe or a world of animal totems. Treating that like a logical daylight world is just silly, but people have different amounts of adult (or child) tolerance for that sort of thing. See romance novels that make no logical sense. <br /><br />Also see Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy as home roleplaying games, where lots of people find one or the other creepy, some dislike both, and some like both.Bansheehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12594214770417497135noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-37628019137038888652019-07-15T03:37:23.032-04:002019-07-15T03:37:23.032-04:00I can't comment on E. B. White's stories a...I can't comment on E. B. White's stories as I haven't read them. However, on the subject of how children vs. mothers perceive stories, I had an interesting expreience I haven't quite come to terms with. Ther eis a traditional Hungarian folk tale (similar to some of the Grimm Bothers' tales, unabridged) in which the hero's quest is to liberate Lady beauty of the Reed (my rough translation) who was enclosed into a reed stem by magic. When he arrives to the place, he is advised to cut the 3 stems of reed he finds, as one conceals the Lady Beauty, the other two her two handmaidens. He must bring the stems back, and NOT cut them open until he arrives to a place with a well with water. In his impatience, two times he stops on the journey back and cuts open two of the stems, out of which come the two handmaidens crying out for water. As he has none to give them, they each die. Now he manages to be patient enough with the last stem of reed until he gets to a water source, and his Lady is thus saved. As a child, I remember perfectly never having any problem with the story, but as a mother reading to my children, I was horrified with the callous disregard for the lives of the two handmaidens, especially that the hero doesn't learn his lesson the first time. <br />I'm aware of many psychological aspects of fairy tales but I can't help wondering about the lessons in them, and about who shall the reader empathize with - which ties this memory to the question raised by you and Simcha. Agneshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00047890626000373572noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-45050503567281361992019-07-12T18:52:09.085-04:002019-07-12T18:52:09.085-04:00This is spot on, the dynamic of Charlotte's We...This is spot on, the dynamic of Charlotte's Web is the maturing of the child's imaginal life. A quibble about your analysis of C.S. Lewis's talking animals though - I don't think they are humans dressed up as animals, rather what Lewis was doing was asking - right, suppose animals as we know them had been ensouled like Adam at creation, what would they be like, how would rationality play out in creatures with that particular form and habit (badger, mouse or whatever)?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-43965936278848834602019-07-11T07:33:14.740-04:002019-07-11T07:33:14.740-04:00This is a really good response. I found Simcha...This is a really good response. I found Simcha's analysis bewildering -- at least, it just seemed on another planet from my experience of those books, though Trumpet of the Swan is the one I read only once, whereas I read Charlotte's Web and Stuart Little over and over as a child, and then over and over to my children, some of whom are now adults. Whatever she as a child or adult reader brought to those stories that made them speak to her in that way, it's not what I brought, and they didn't speak to me in the same way at all. <br /><br />As you well know, every fiction writer is creating a world, and that world, even when it looks like our own familiar one and not a fantasy universe, has its rules. In E.B. White's various worlds, the rules involve various levels of sentience for animals -- and this opens up ways to explore things like empathy, as you say, in a way that speaks to at least some children. I thought your point about caring more about the cat than the neighbor was exactly right. And ultimately, I think that's one of those things that are just morally neutral . . . I don't think it's actually theologically problematic to create animal characters, who in our world wouldn't have souls, with properties that indicate the presence of a soul (sentience, reflection, a sense of right and wrong, etc). It's just part of an imaginative world, and a way to work something out imaginatively within the laws of that world. <br /><br />So, I don't know. Obviously a book will not speak in the same way to everyone, but to find White's books creepy and nihilistic just seems . . . extreme? I also think, after many years of homeschooling: Well, great, here's one more set of books for homeschool mothers to worry about. Sally Thomashttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05014351173194941624noreply@blogger.com